Nestor Carbonell Quotes

Working on camera is a different ballgame in the sense that it's far more intimate work, but the basics and the foundations of being able to create something that isn't necessarily your own instincts - is a character that you have inside your head - whether you're talking about television or film or theater, that still has to be the grounding work.

The actor cannot afford to look only to his own life for all his material nor pull strictly from his own experience to find his acting choices and feelings.

Obviously an actor draws on his own experience.

It's easier to see in someone else, another actor, how they kind of disappear and then this other persona appears. A great actor is a thing of mystery.

An actor is an actor is an actor. The less personality an actor has off stage the better. A blank canvas on which to draw the characters he plays.

Sometimes when you're playing a very intense character, a disturbed character, you find other layers. That's much more interesting to me, rather than just playing 'intense.' I find it too boring.

Whether it's a very dramatic part or a comical role, I feel I need to create the same thing: a full-fledged, three-dimensional character that the audience can identify with.

I think that's how any actor would make their performance convincing: by bringing an element of themselves into the character.

You never know the depth of an actor.

You have got to dig deep into your own spectrum while playing a character. If I am playing evil, believe me, I am bringing out the evil from within me.

You don't have to kill somebody to play a murderer. You have to read the script and interpret the character.

Acting is broad enough a church that you can pick your races, decide which way you want to go at different times.I think that the story and circumstance tends to dictate the most and then what you do with your own approach after that.

I've only had one dramatic role in my entire career and when I did it, I was in heaven and I thought, 'Oh my god, I'm going to get more of these.'

As an actor, the last thing you ever want to end up on is just a procedural show where you're just a talking head. There's nothing worse than just spitting out words. Words interrupt performance. Performance is king in my world, when it comes to why I'm in this business.

I don't think an actor needs to necessarily go through his things to do his job. I think it's way more important to imagine. And then, when you're imagining, your experiences, your images and your own personal things will show up, but you keep imagining. You don't get stuck in your own personal things, otherwise you are telling your story in every character, and that's not interesting for anybody.

I started doing roles and working with people that I really respected and became passionate about the art form of acting. And I'm still trying to figure it out. Still learning.

I try to inhabit each of the characters as fully as I can, however short-lived they are. But most of my show happens offstage.

Always when I directed the play, I was always trying to cast people not who were necessarily like the characters, but people who I felt had the essential component that the character had, some kind of soul for it.

What makes an actor, I think, is a combination of a deep curiosity about life and a case of the crazies.

I guess you should approach the roles differently when they're actual people who have been, this is the difference. Getting the accent exact, or the hair exact is less important in a situation like this.

If you can just actually let the character be for a bit, then you get the right sense.

Good acting comes from finding the essence of a character.

You can find a connection with any Shakespeare role you play.

Claude Rains was what we call an actor's actor. He was very involved with himself and his performance.

Vary the pace... is one of the foundations of all good acting.